Shaili Chopra (Founder, SheThePeople) talks to IndianCEO

Shaili Chopra is one of India’s top television editor-presenters, an author and now a successful digital media entrepreneur. In March 2016 Shaili was announced one of India’s Top 50 Most Influential Women in Media, Marketing and Advertising by IMPACT Magazine. She is the founder of two success startups called GolfingIndian.com and SheThePeople.TV

In her last role, she was the Senior Editor and Lead Anchor at ET NOW, the Economic Times Business News Channel and earlier with India’s largest tv network NDTV where she was part of the core team that set up their business channel NDTV Profit.

Shaili received India’s highest honor in journalism The Ramnath Goenka Award for best in Business Journalism. She also won the Media Foundation Best Business Anchor Award for 2010 and in the same year the Federation of Indian Industry (FICCI) gave her the Young Women’s Achiever Award for contribution to media. She also won the News Television Award for the Best Reporter.

IndianCEO: How was the 1 year journey for SheThePeople.TV?

Shaili Chopra: Building a much-needed digital media space and ecosystem for women that’s dedicated to championing and promoting their success stories is an important achievement for us. The journey has been full of surprises including the fact that passions can truly turn into reality. That one can become part of the change-maker community with an effort like this – that notion has been a drive force for me.

We at SheThePeople.TV, Empower, Engage and Elevate – reflecting how we are not just about telling stories but being ‘part’ of them.

10000 interviews. 1200 videos. Key partners in StartUp India, Make In India, UN Women, ORF, Global Compact. Founding Digital Women Awards. Ground breaking work and interviews. Social, cultural, intellectual and financial achievers and more. 100,000 women engaged with through our monthly efforts and events. To me these are great energies. Creating new dialogue, opening up new strands of thought around women in the country – that to me has been hugely satisfying.

IndianCEO: What motivated you to start SheThePeople and why did you choose video over words?

Shaili Chopra: If a picture says a 1000 words, a video says a million. An award winning television journalist and 15 years of being on the screen, to me this was a no brainer. We don’t have a separate section for videos. Moving pictures is who we are. Videos have life and it’s that’s life we are aiming to capture. Today we are India’s largest video base of women’s stories.

IndianCEO: It’s been 1yr and 10,000 women entrepreneur stories, what next after getting funded?

Shaili Chopra: Funding is a milestone, not an end in itself. Getting Anand Mahindra on board isn’t just about money. It’s his philosophy and belief in women and what we do.

My resolve is to contribute a platform to women in India who enrich our lives, inspire, achieve and shatter glass ceilings in every sector. Women with a view. Women who are firebrand, fierce and fearless.

We don’t just need those same ten faces on every other ‘list.’ We need to get millions on the achievers list. And they exist. It’s just about finding them and telling the world.

IndianCEO: Can you give us some details on the funding story, what motivated Anand Mahindra to fund SheThePeople?

Shaili Chopra: Mr Mahindra said ‘ Women need a space that quenches their intellectual hunger, engages, and empowers them with relatable content. With Shaili as founder possessing a solid understanding of both conventional and digital media over 15 years, I have great confidence that SheThePeople.TV will become a focal point of inspiration for tomorrow’s women leaders.’

That speaks for itself.

IndianCEO: Any advice to budding startup entrepreneurs about funding options?

Shaili Chopra: I believe I am a budding entrepreneur yet. There is something new I learn about this journey all the time. Funding is a comma in yourself. Your own clarity is all that matters.

Startups generally celebrate every small reason, But if the reason is about a milestone achievement then it makes a big difference. This victorious path is not an easier one and we have faced and surpassed many challenges in the last few months to meet our target of half a million visitors. While our ambition is a much bigger number, the target we achieved was planned towards the end of the financial year and our team made it possible 4 months in advance.

Indeed a great effort by Shishir Kumar and the entire team and a special thanks to the avid readers of IndianCEO for following us. IndianCEO is indeed my first bet in to media business and believe me this is just the beginning. Early next year we have some great product announcements and our next milestone is not far away.